References for making maps (links and tips!)

[hilly22]

I cant play the maps at all i press f9 do everything the tuts say, the compile log appears (does scroll down thingy) gets to the end of the log and stops. Nope it does not crash i can cick the exit button. It just stops??

Is there a places i should be saving/putting the budding map file?

Jeremy

P.s woot my 100th post!!

[The_Pope]

if you look at this image (its a URL to stop hotlinking)

http://www.interlopers.net/images/hl2tutorials/cs_first_room/pic8.jpg

you see there is a box called 'Don't run game after compiling' untick it

if that doesnt work, open up the game manually, go into the console and put in:

map <nameofyourmap>

it should load up your map, if it still doesnt then theres something wrong wiht your pointfilr locations.... so say if it still doesnt work

[hilly22]

Yeah i forgt to mention i know about the untick thingy i do that but it still doesnt work

ill try that console thingy


h

[kuma]

check thorugh to compile list to see if there was any error creating the map. also check your settings to see that hammer is putting your map in the right folder

[hilly22]

which folder is it meant to go into?

h

[The_Pope]

c:\...\Steam\SteamApps\<yourusername>\CSSource (or somit similar)\cstrike\maps

and its gotta be the .bsp

[kuma]

Also make sure when you start up SDK you set it to css at the bottom

[hilly22]

Ill get back to u shortly to see if it solved the problem


h

[Anti_badBoy^]

lol i cant do this for shizzle !!

[hilly22]

Yeah stuff this im going to play battlefield. stuff making maps.

I have heard a rumour of some software which will complie maps for you.

basically you can creat real life maps. So you get a video camera film everything (the area) and when you are done the software will compile the map for you.

Is that rumour a pile of bull?

J

[The_Pope]

kinda

you can get a stil image from a site (they mapped quite a bit of real life places) and use a program to make it a 3d model and import it into hammer

its a lot of hassle though

[EvolvedMonkey]

Yeah stuff this im going to play battlefield. stuff making maps.

I have heard a rumour of some software which will complie maps for you.

basically you can creat real life maps. So you get a video camera film everything (the area) and when you are done the software will compile the map for you.

Is that rumour a pile of bull?

J

Its probably not bull but the software would probably be VERY expensive and you would probably need a military/SFX editing spec machine to render it efficiently.

Mapping takes time. You cannot create a quality map in 10 minutes. Ive been working on one since source was released and im still only half done. Be patient. It will come.

[The_Pope]

how about some screenies monkey?

[kuma]

Anyone know of any good texture making tuts? I got photoshop cs so anything that uses that will be great.
I need a few custom ones made for the map Im working on. Haven't tried making any b4 just wondered if theres any to give me a bit of a start instead of me just trying and failing misserably .

[pzych0]

I've been looking for some of those as well - I've never really got into map making for that reason.

[The_Pope]

http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Creating_a_Material_Tutorial

Try that, however it doesnt explain how to make the texture itself, ask some good arty peeps to tell you how to get it to tile etc

[kuma]

I just want to make a few signs maybe a door or 2

[kuma]

Making custom textures

1. Okay so first you need your texture. In source the textures need to be in TGA format, you can easily save it in that format if you use Photoshop. The image size follows the same rules as before, sizes like 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, etc. are allowed, they are all powers of 2, and there isn't really a limit for how big they are, but I guess 1024x1024 is more then enough.

2. Now in order to use your texture you need to create a folder in Valve\Steam\Steamapps\username\sourcesdk_content\cstrike\materialsrc
give the folder any name you want and put all your .tga files in there. You can also have a txt file with the same name as your texture with some commands, which will be executed when you compile the texture. The commands are:

$nolod Do not use lower quality versions of this texture in lower Direct X versions
$nomip Do not make mip-levels for this texture
$clamps / $clampt Do not allow the texture to wrap in the S or T coordinate space, respectively. This is most often used for sprites that are not tiled
$skybox Used for compiling skyboxes. This assures the edges match between each facet
$startframe (integer) / $endframe (integer) Used for animated textures. Textures must be named as texture000, texture001, texture002, etc. The $startframe defines the beginning frame and the $endframe defines the ending frame.
$nocompress Do not use compression on this texture. Useful for textures with fine gradation (like light halos)
$nonice Do not use NICE filtering on this texture’s lower mip-levels
$dxt5 Use DXT5 compression instead of full compression


3. Now comes the hard part although it's not that hard. Go to Valve\Steam\SteamApps\username\sourcesdk\bin\ and you'll find in there a exe called VTEX. Now right click on it and select the "create shortcut" option. This will create a shortcut to that program in which we can add several command options, so open the shortcut properties and in the end of the target field add the following commands:

-mkdir -shader LightmappedGeneric "C:\Valve\Steam\SteamApps\username\sourcesdk_content\cstrike\materialsrc\texturedir\*.tga"

(remember to change username, texturedir & *.tga to your relevent names)

So what this does is, create a new folder, then tells the program which shader your using, in this case lightmappedGeneric, but you can use whatever shader you want, then it picks up all the TGA files in the folder you pointed, and converts them in to VTF and VMF, which are your materials files.
If you go to Valve\Steam\Steamapps\usename\counter-strike source\cstrike\materials
you'll see your materials folder in there, and if you open it you will see a VMF, and a VTF, with your texture name.

4. The last thing to do it's to edit the VMT files so that they act like they are supposed to, basically we are going to say to the engine that this is wood, this is metal, this is concrete etc. So open a VMT file in notepad, you will see something like:

"LightmappedGeneric"
{
"$baseTexture" "yourfolder/yourtexturename"
}

After the "$basetexture" line add "$surfaceprop" "materialname" in wich you replace the materialname for the type of material your texture is. The following names are the some types of materials you can add:



CONCRETE/ROCK TYPES:
baserock
boulder
brick
concrete
concrete_block
gravel
rock

LIQUID TYPES:
slime
water
wade

METAL TYPES:
chain
chainlink
metal
metalbox
metalgrate
metalpanel
metalvent
slipperymetal
solidmetal

MISC TYPES:
computer
default
glass
ladder

ORGANIC TYPES
alienflesh
bloodyflesh
flesh
watermelon

SNOW TYPES:
ice
snow

TERRAIN TYPES:
antlionsand
quicksand
dirt
mud
slipperyslime
grass
tile

gravel

WOOD TYPES:
wood
woodbox
woodcrate
wood_furniture
wood_lowdensity
wood_plank
wood_panel
wood_solid

I didn't test all of this materials so some may not work, or need some specific settings.

I would like to thank BaRRaKID @ Interlopers for this tutorial

I hope this helps all that uses it

[The_Pope]

just noticed kuma's post and added it to the start, im gonna add some more things at the start later today, so if anyone wants anything in particular just give us a shout

[The_Pope]

sorry for double post:

added in how to make a map look and play better!